Facebook: Maybe Thinking about Superapps?

May 23, 2022

The idea of popping up a level is a good one. Examples range from companies offering ways to manage multiple APIs to services hooking consumers with individual providers, regardless of where the providers call home.

“Wikipedia Over WhatsApp” explains:

If the wifi is letting WhatsApp messages through, what if we used WhatsApp as a vehicle for the information we really care about? Much like we encapsulate the rest of our networking objects in higher-level objects, we could encapsulate web pages inside of WhatsApp messages.

Okay, who is really excited about reading Wikimedia’s entry about my relative Vladimir Igorevich Arnold, a mathematician, which is an exciting profession to be sure? Not too many people.

The idea of using WhatsApp as a mechanism for other services is a good one. Is it Facebook’s attempt to become a superapp or allow others to use WhatsApp as a superapp.

Some encrypted end to end messaging services include a number of useful functions now. But what if almost any traditional browser based function could be supported within a messaging app on one’s mobile phone. Apple uses a “up a level” method with its requirement that browser developers honor and respect the wonderful WebKit thing.

Interesting if true.

Stephen E Arnold, May 23, 2022

Written by Stephen E. Arnold · Filed Under Facebook, News, Social Media

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Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.